14. CALLUM
14
CALLUM
Knocking on Chloe’s door, there is no response. Waiting, I knock again.
There’s a light melody coming from inside her apartment, so I know she is home. Turning my ear to the door, the song changes to O.A.R.’s “Love and Memories.”
I try the knob, it’s unlocked.
Her flat is warm, sunlight coating the entire place.
All the windows are open, the breeze from outside blowing the curtains. It smells like the end of summer and flowers.
I spot the vase on her counter, the flowers wilting in the yellowing water. My spine tingles as I rub my thumb on the paper in my hand.
Passing the piano along the wall, I—I didn’t notice this last time or knew she played.
A thin film of dust collects on the pads of my fingers as I run it along the keys. Maybe she doesn’t play.
Peeking into her bedroom, I don’t find Chloe.
“Dais,” I call out for her.
“Outside,” her voice sings before she resumes humming along to the song.
I walk over to the windows. Old enough that they are original to the building, the one on the far left is opened outward.
I climb over the window sill. This might be okay for her height to get outside, but the crouch and bend for my 6’3” body is uncomfortable .
The last note of the song fades seamlessly to the next. Chloe hasn’t acknowledged my presence yet, which is alarming. An unlocked door and not caring who is in her space?
Chloe sings a verse, eyes closed and upper body moving gently as if she’s attuned with lyrics.
I don’t interrupt, soaking in the sight of her.
Feet propped up on the rail, slouched in the white wicker chair. All her skin, inked and non-inked, is displayed as she sunbathes. Her tan skin even more kissed by the sun, popping against the wicker. She has more tattoos than I remember from those ten minutes she pranced around Emerson’s place naked.
Her right arm is covered in fine line tattoos. Across her right shoulder blade is a word in a language I don’t recognize. The strap of her bikini covers part of a bouquet of flowers—like the ones waiting for her inside—on her upper rib cage.
All of her tattoos are beautiful, and fitting, but my favorite are her natural ones. The ones tattooed in clusters on her body. Her freckles.
“You have a beautiful voice.”
Slowly, her head rolls in my direction. “Stalking me?” The Chloe expression I expected to find on her face.
I shake my head. “Admiring the view.”
I think I see it, maybe if I squint or put on my glasses, but she’s blushing. The rose gold hue mixing with her tinted cheeks from the sun.
“What are you doing here?” she asks, brows raised.
“I wanted to thank you for the other week.”
“Ahh, yes. When I gallantly saved your life. Didn’t think throwing up on my sheets was good enough?”
I know she is joking, but that doesn’t ease the immediate guilt or worry within me.
“I’m sorry again.”
“It’s no biggie, again. ”
Chloe drops her feet, toes painted a dusty pink color, from the metal they were resting on. She stands, pulling the shirt from the back of the chair over her body. Arms in the air, my eyes linger on the planes of her toned body.
Black string bikini.
Long legs. Hips that narrow into a slim waist, that would fit perfectly in my hands. Her breasts—
“Eyes up here, Pretty Boy.”
“I wasn’t. . .”
“You were.” I open my mouth to talk, but she beats me to it. The shirt covers her torso and hangs mid-thigh.
She walks past me, climbing back inside her living room. I follow behind her.
Chloe dips into the bathroom, quickly grabbing a clip. Brushing her hair off the nape of her neck and pinning it up. A few baby strands fall out. She tries to pull them into the clip, but they fall again.
While she’s distracted, I snag the flowers off the counter, putting them behind my back.
“Are you thirsty?” She pulls out two waters and two cans of Diet Coke from her fridge. “I’m trying to cut back on my coffee intake.”
“Replacing it with Diet Coke?”
“Need to find solace in this country somehow.” Her eyes flick to mine, then to the arm reaching behind my back. “What are you hiding?”
I give her a soft smile before revealing the bouquet of wildflowers—all blues and purples with accents of eucalyptus and white wild daisies.
“These are for you,” I say nervously. Why am I nervous? It’s flowers.
Chloe is stunned. I stunned her. She’s not speaking, her mouth agape and eyes blinking rapidly as they home in on the flowers, studying them meticulously. “No one’s ever brought me flowers,” she finally says .
I pass the paper-wrapped flowers to her, our fingers brushing as she grasps the stems.
Chloe brings them in front of her face, smelling them audibly.
“You bought me flowers.” Her statement is more of a question, and I instantly question my decision to do this.
“Boyfriends are supposed to buy their girlfriends flowers.”
“ Fake boyfriend,” she corrects. “Which you aren’t.” Yet. Her dark brows raise. I cock my head to the side. “Doesn’t matter if you were real, anyway. All my real ones never did.”
I gulp. Did I mess up doing this? It’s weird. It’s weird I bought her flowers.
Chloe must read my mind. Slivers of silver peer at me over the tops of the petals. “It’s not weird, maybe surprising. Kind.”
She keeps talking for a second, trailing off before rambling again. I make out bits and pieces between my thoughts. They skip between anger that no one has ever bought her flowers, every girl deserves them, especially my wildflower. My daisy .
And that’s the other thought.
My daisy.
Our quick friendship is deeper than anything I’ve ever had—even with Liam and George. My connection with Chloe stretches beyond a surface-level conversation with someone at the bar to try to take her home.
More than a potential fake girlfriend status.
This moment right here, I feel a possessiveness, a protectiveness over her clicking into place. Like she is mine to take care of and that I’d do anything to make her smile.
“Thank you,” she says louder. Chloe must have already expressed her gratitude based on how round her eyes are.
“You’re welcome.” I smile. “Where are your vases? We can probably make a few with the bouquet.”
Chloe points me in the direction of the vases. Adding water to each, we spend the next ten minutes cutting and building each smaller bouquet when I learn that her mom is a florist .
She’s scrapping her hand on the counter like a broom, collecting all the fallen petals and leaves into a pile on the linoleum.
“Do you play piano?” I ask.
Her face goes flat, shoulders stiffen. She does a big sweep of her pile into the trash can, body straightening after.
“No.” Her eyes float to the piano, lingering on the keys hauntingly. “My brother played, but when he stopped, I favored the piece too much to get rid of it. I asked if I could have it. I tried to learn to play a handful of years ago. Took lessons for an entire spring but could never pick it up.”
“I play,” I blurt.
Chloe’s face brightens with surprise.
“I know, shocker, a suit-clad, finance bro,”—I air quotebro—“reads books, drinks tea, and plays piano.” I snicker. “I was captain of my rugby team, don’t worry.”
“Not at all worried.” She takes one of the vases, places it on the piano, and readjusts the picture frame. “When did you learn to play?”
“When I was seven.”
“How did you get into playing?” It was the only thing my brothers didn’t succeed at and I thought I’d be noticed for once by my mother. It’s the only thing she let me continue to do before suggesting I play rugby.
“Appreciation for the arts,” I give her a half-truth.
“Do you play classics?”
“Classics at first, but then I started playing what was popular on the radio. What I was listening to.” What my brothers were listening to. “This kind of music.” I point at the air as if the music was tangible around us.
“I’d want to play this kind of music, too. He used to play a lot of Goo Goo Dolls. “Iris” was always my favorite.”
If there was a song for me, maybe Chloe, I think it’d be that one. We keep talking about music and our childhood. Both hesitant and darting around answers, as the sun sets and the world fades to black.
I take our take-out containers to the trash. We talked for hours when her stomach growled, and we both realized we hadn’t eaten yet. I ordered Vietnamese noodle bowls, and we walked Tucker to pick them up.
There was a comfortable silence that fell between us. Neither of us finding the need to fill the space with wasted words. While I love the sound of her voice, this is nice.
There’s no pressure to impress her. No worries cross my mind that I’m not good enough for her. I don’t wonder what expectations she has for me.
There is only peace. Stillness.
When I look at Chloe, I see it too. That maybe I’m also some sort of safe space for her.
“Our hotel is opening next week. Do you want to come?”
“Like as your date?”
“No. Yes. I—I’ll be working during and needing to mingle, but yes, as my date.”
She scrunches her nose, brow furrowing in deliberation. She’s cute pretending to think deeply about this.
“Liam already asked me, Pretty Boy. Sorry.” She bursts my bubble with a shrug. “It’s like homecoming; gotta be quicker to the top picks.”
Homecoming? What is a homecoming?
My confusion must come off differently because Chloe says, “I was already planning on it. Figured it was chapter three of How to Be a Fake Girlfriend for Dummies.”
“Is that a yes?”
“Test run. Gotta see what I’m working with.”